The Bus

Big city + free shuttle bus + me with 2 kids looking for cheap entertainment = 1 unique experience.

Mary loves riding the bus. Actually, she's not too picky about her form of mass transit. Be it a bus, a taxi, the subway, it's all good. Our hotel is 1 block away from a mile long pedestrian mall. There's a free shuttle bus that runs the entire length stopping at every corner. Guess what she always wants to do? Ride the bus. You can see some pretty interesting people on the bus.

There was the girl (in her 20's- I hesitate to call her a woman) with her pet mouse. Yep, mouse. Reminded me of Mr. Jingles from the movie "The Green Mile", except that it was death row, the mouse did tricks and of course, it was a MOVIE, so he couldn't jump down and bite one of my kids. This girl was walking around with this mouse on her shoulder. It would walk up and down her arms and back behind her neck. Yuck! Of course, Mary was fascinated and wanted to touch it (I quickly vetoed that idea). A couple other crazy ladies got in on the fun and took turns petting it and letting it crawl around on the seat. Ewww!! One lady who looked like she had seen better days (I counted only 2 teeth) said she used to have a pet mouse that lived in her shirt for 7 years. I actually felt bad for that mouse. She said hers loved beer. Well, duh. If I had to live in her shirt, I'd probably consume a lot of beer too. I decided we'd had enough of mouse girl, so we hopped off the bus and pretended to be interested in the Colorado Visitors Center. Mary scored a free hologram postcard out of that deal.

We got back on the bus with the plan that we would ride it to the end, come back to the hotel for lunch, than take an extra early nap. 4 1/2 hrs of sleep does not a happy mother make. Jet lag stinks, esp. with kids who don't want to sleep. Anyway, back to the bus story, we get on and end up sitting next to an older man who smells like he's been pickled in alcohol. Maybe he's using it as a preservative. He kept trying to get Adam to smile, but he refused. He said, "Oh well, maybe when he gets older, he'll warm up." I wanted to say, "Maybe he'd smile at you if you didn't stink and weren't a tad bit creepy." I smiled and nodded instead. To the other side of us, there was a woman with a very large lip piercing. Mary looked at me and whispered (not so quietly), "What's that thing sticking out of her face?" Ahh, the honesty of children. Public transportation sure can be interesting. I can say we probaly would never have seen anything like this in Japan.

So even though I was tired and cranky, we got out of the room and had a mini adventure. Now both kids are racked out and it's my turn to join them. I wonder what's in store for this afternoon?